Ranking the top 20 goals in Alex Ovechkin’s record-breaking career
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Greg Wyshynski
“The Gr8 Chase” is over. Alex Ovechkin is the NHL’s all-time leading goal scorer, surpassing the legendary Wayne Gretzky.
Ovechkin amassed this career total in a variety of ways. He had over 550 even-strength goals and 320 power-play goals, the majority scored from the fabled “Ovi spot.” He’s the leader in empty-net goals and overtime goals. Five of his goals came shorthanded, from a guy who has averaged eight seconds of penalty-killing time per game in his career.
But not every Ovechkin goal is created equally. Some are works of art; some are masterpieces. Some are important; some are career-defining.
Here are the top 20 goals in Ovechkin’s career, covering both the NHL regular season and the Stanley Cup playoffs.
Many of them have become highlight-reel mainstays, while some make this ranking because of their significance to Ovechkin’s legacy and story. Along the way you’ll hear from Ovechkin, his teammates, coaches and opponents about these classic moments during the first 895 goals of the Washington Capitals star’s career. Enjoy!
20. Dec. 18, 2015: Ovechkin shocks the Lightning
You could sense this one was imminent as Jason Chimera floated a juicy pass from the boards into the Lightning zone.
Ovi motored to collect the puck and then froze Tampa Bay defenseman Anton Stralman with a textbook curl-and-drag for a gorgeous power-play goal against Ben Bishop.
19. June 7, 2018: Ovechkin’s Stanley Cup Final moment
We’ve seen Ovechkin score this kind of power-play goal hundreds of times. But until Game 5 against the Golden Knights, we’d never seen him score one in a clinching game for a Stanley Cup championship, after a postseason worthy of the Conn Smythe Trophy as playoff MVP.
“A lot of things were said at the end of last year in the press, Twitter, whatever,” said Barry Trotz, who coached that championship team. “And they’re hurtful, and I think he took it personally. He said, ‘I’m going to show you I’m still a great player.’ And he did.”
18. March 9, 2011: Ovechkin plays defense vs. the Oilers
Criticisms of Ovechkin’s defensive prowess have haunted him throughout his career, to the point where former Capitals coach Dale Hunter briefly tried to turn him into a shot blocker rather than a shot taker.
But Ovechkin had his moments on D, such as this play where he picked the pocket of Oilers defenseman Kurtis Foster on the forecheck to set up a 2-on-0 scoring chance and easily converted.
17. Oct. 5, 2005: Career goal No. 1
Where it all began. The Capitals opened their season at home against the Columbus Blue Jackets in front of an announced crowd of 16,325. Just 28 seconds after the Jackets took the lead in the second period, Ovechkin skated between the circles with his stick raised for a one-timer.
Dainius Zubrus found him, and Ovi blasted a shot past future trivia answer Pascal Leclaire for the first of many, many, many goals.
16. March 19, 2022: Ovechkin vs. Chicago (and Duncan Keith)
By the time Ovechkin schooled him on national television, future Hall of Fame defenseman Duncan Keith had already won a Norris Trophy and a Stanley Cup.
What he couldn’t do was stop this move from Ovechkin, who tantalizingly dangled the puck within Keith’s stick range before pulling it back through his legs and motoring around him for the goal, as three Blackhawks stood seemingly powerless around their net.
15. March 1, 2011: OT winner vs. Islanders
The NHL was playing 4-on-4 in overtime back in 2011, but Ovechkin was playing one-on-one against Frans Nielsen in this extra session against the Islanders.
Ovechkin turned the New York forward inside out with a burst of speed through the neutral zone. He then skated through a check attempt by Nielsen in the attacking zone before finishing this goal with a nasty backhander that goalie Nathan Lawson apparently didn’t know was in Ovi’s bag of tricks.
14. March 19, 2009: The ‘hot stick’ celebration
Ovechkin’s 50th goal in the 2008-09 season sparked one of the most memorable and controversial moments of his career: the “hot stick” celebration, as Ovechkin laid his lumber on the ice and warmed his gloves over its imaginary flames.
It was a moment commemorated in everything from bobblehead dolls to video game cutscenes. But “Hockey Night in Canada” analyst Don Cherry hated it, criticizing Ovechkin’s lack of “class” in showing up the Lightning and rookie goalie Mike McKenna.
Years later on the “I Was in Net For” podcast, McKenna admitted that he might have “slashed Ovechkin’s stick into the next ZIP code” had he been a league veteran at the time. But he also said he and Ovechkin talked it out about a week later.
“I remember just saying ‘Hi’ and him saying, ‘I did not mean to embarrass or disrespect you or anything. I thought we were having fun.’ He was apologetic about it, and you know what? I was totally cool with it,” McKenna said. “For him to even take that time to just be a human and say, ‘This is what I was feeling in the moment,’ I have a hard time holding that against anybody, especially if they can have the humility to think maybe it wasn’t nice or right.”
13. Nov. 20, 2014: The end boards goal vs. the Avalanche
This goal has a bit of everything that makes Ovechkin such a force. The speed through the neutral zone. The drag around defenseman Jan Hejda, followed by the brute force that had Hejda helplessly trying to put a body on him. Finally, the patience to stay with the play to collect the rebound and tuck it past goalie Reto Berra.
The only box not checked was a booming Ovechkin slap shot, as it went to the backhand to set up this sequence.
12. Oct. 10, 2015: Ovechkin schools Moore, Devils
Ovechkin’s first goal of the 2015-16 season landed him in the highlight reel and gave New Jersey Devils defenseman John Moore a harsh education. After speeding into the zone, Ovechkin faked a move to his right and dangled to his left, leaving Moore to fecklessly wave his stick at the Capitals star. Ovechkin closed in on goalie Keith Kinkaid and deposited a shot over his glove and into the far top corner of the net.
“I think there he’s going to cut to the middle,” Moore told The Star-Ledger at the time. “To his credit, I think he kind of sold that. I could have a better stick and maybe even a better gap. You give him an inch and he’ll capitalize on it. I’ll learn from that.”
11. May 1, 2018: The double-tap goal
The Capitals won their first Stanley Cup championship after finally overcoming their tormentors from Pittsburgh in the semifinals. Ovechkin scored one of his finest goals to win Game 3 of that series. Nicklas Backstrom did his usual yeoman’s work on the play, generating a turnover in the defensive zone to spring a 2-on-1. He fed Ovechkin across the ice, and Ovechkin clanged a shot off the post behind Matt Murray … and then popped the aerial rebound into the open net.
“I honestly think that from the first time we started playing with each other, we were just a good match. I was more of a playmaker and he was a goal scorer,” Backstrom said recently. “I mean, I just think he loves to score goals. That’s what’s been driving him for all these years.”
10. Jan. 19, 2006: Ovechkin goes full throttle vs. the Blues
As Capitals announcer Joe Beninati said it best: Ovechkin goes “full throttle” through the neutral zone and then absolutely flummoxes veteran St. Louis Blues defenseman Eric Weinrich before putting the puck through goalie Curtis Sanford.
In a 2022 interview with The Athletic, Ovechkin actually ranked this goal as his second favorite from a list of 10 compiled by the NHL.
“I had full speed and make a good move,” he said. “It was a total different game than now. It was more wide-open. Now it’s now more compact.”
Ovechkin also noted that this goal came immediately after another classic goal he scored against Phoenix on Jan. 16 that you might be able to read more about later on this list …
9. Jan. 25, 2014: Ovechkin vs. Canadiens juggle
In which we discover Ovechkin can juggle, too.
Ovi collects a rebound from a Carey Price save midair in back of the Montreal net. He hits it with his stick, juggles it off his stick again to nudge it closer to the goal mouth, then taps it past Price for a power-play goal, raising his arms and bellowing in celebration.
“You’re not going to see a prettier goal from a so-called ‘hands guy’ in the NHL,” Capitals announcer Craig Laughlin said.
8. Feb. 4, 2010: The one-handed classic
The 500th point of Ovechkin’s career, this goal crystallizes the futility of trying to stop the Russian Machine when he’s got the magic working.
Backstrom finds him in full stride. Rangers defenseman Michal Rozsival reaches out with his arm and attempts to impede Ovechkin. The referee’s arm goes up and then almost immediately points to the net as Ovechkin dangled through the hold and sent a one-handed shot — with his left arm, no less — at the pads of Henrik Lundqvist. The puck glanced off King Henrik’s stick and popped into the net.
Ovechkin would say after the game that it was, to his recollection, the first goal he ever scored with one hand on his stick because “my hand is not strong enough” to score that way. As the New York Times headline said after the Capitals’ 6-5 win: “Rangers Surrender Game and Stage to Ovechkin Show.”
7. April 6, 2025: Ovechkin eclipses Gretzky
At 12:34 of the second period against the New York Islanders on April 6, Ovechkin finally eclipsed “The Great One” with his 895th career goal. He could have broken the record in his previous game at home had he completed a hat trick against the Chicago Blackhawks, but Ovechkin vowed not set the mark on an empty netter. Instead, history was made with a vintage Ovi goal: a blast from the top of the circle on the power play that Ovechkin followed with a full belly slide down the ice in celebration.
The quality of this goal never mattered. The enormity of the moment in sports history necessitated its inclusion in the top 10, as Ovechkin netted career goal No. 895 to pass Gretzky and become the NHL’s all-time leading goal scorer.
This is what Gretzky wanted. He encouraged Ovechkin, whether it was in interviews or private text messages during the chase. It’s a lesson Gretzky learned when he was chasing the record himself, back when Hockey Hall of Famer Gordie Howe owned it.
“My dad said, ‘You know what, somebody is going to break your record. And when he does, make sure you are as much a gentleman to him as Gordie Howe is to you. You smile, you shake his hand, and you are proud of what you accomplished. It’s better for the game,'” Gretzky told Sportsnet in 2020.
The game has never been better, whether it’s the speed or the defense or the goaltending or the coaching or the league’s overall talent level. That Ovechkin shattered this record, in this era, is nothing short of extraordinary.
3:27
Alex Ovechkin breaks Wayne Gretzky’s goals record
Alex Ovechkin scores on the power play for his 895th career goal, surpassing Wayne Gretzky’s record.
6. Dec. 26, 2008: Ovechkin slugs Buffalo
One word: “Buffaslug.”
Ovechkin’s 2008 instant classic goal was scored against a Buffalo Sabres team wearing one of the most maligned jerseys in NHL history, as the franchise forwent its classic crest for a new design featuring an angry cashew. We can only assume Ovi was making them pay for their crime against fashion with this end-to-end beauty.
He starts by tipping the puck away from a Sabres forechecker and then he’s off to the races. Buffalo defenseman Henrik Tallinder does everything he can to track down Ovechkin and appears to take the puck away from him, but it turns out Ovechkin had it the entire time, like one of those pranks where a dollar bill is tied to a string. Ovechkin shoots as he falls to the ice, beating Patrick Lalime before sliding into him like a curling stone.
5. May 2, 2015: Ovechkin from his knee vs. the Rangers
Another playoff goal, during one of several postseason meetings between Ovechkin and the New York Rangers, and easily one of his most impressive given the personnel involved.
That’s Ryan McDonagh and Dan Girardi on defense for the Rangers, one of the league’s best pairings at that time. That’s Hall of Famer Henrik Lundqvist in goal, looking behind him before looking to the rafters. Ovechkin split the defense, causing the Rangers blueliners to collide like a closing door. The Capitals star slipped through a crack but his leg got caught. He fell to his knee and snapped a shot before falling on his stomach.
Teammate Evgeny Kuznetsov felt the goal was “sick,” according to the New York Post. “I said a couple of bad words in Russian but I said ‘sick,'” he said.
4. Dec. 20, 2014: Too ‘dangle-licious’ for you
This goal against the New Jersey Devils inspired Capitals play-by-play announcer Joe Beninati to coin the term “dangle-licious” to describe the tally.
Ovechkin streaked through the neutral zone toward Devils defenseman Jon Merrill, who was probably breathing a sigh of relief knowing that teammate Travis Zajac was skating back to offer support. But as Zajac reached for the puck with his stick, Ovechkin toe-dragged around Merrill and headed to the crease. Goalie Cory Schneider had the bottom of the net closed off as Ovechkin fell to the ice … only to have the Capitals star backhand the puck under the crossbar for another epic goal.
“He was flying tonight. You can see why he’s such a dangerous player,” Schneider said. “He made a great move. I stayed with him and I thought I had him. He was able to elevate it in tight like that and finish it off. I stuck with him and I thought I had that one. He made a great play on the end.”
3. April 24, 2009: Ovechkin playoff goal vs. the Rangers
Straight-up video game moves from Ovechkin in this postseason goal against the Rangers.
After a turnover by Nikolai Zherdev, Ovechkin collects the puck and streaks down the ice. Chris Drury attempts to slow him up and gets deked into oblivion. Derek Morris makes an attempt, only to have Ovechkin dangle through his legs. Aaron Voros finally catches up to Ovechkin only to have the Capitals star smack the puck with his backhand to put it past Lundqvist.
“My backhand was terrible. Lucky bounce,” Ovechkin said at the time.
Well, lucky for him.
2. Feb. 18, 2009: The ‘Hamrlik goal’
In 2011, veteran defenseman Roman Hamrlik signed as a free agent with the Capitals, becoming Ovechkin’s teammate. Which naturally begs the question: Did they ever talk about this goal?
Hamrlik was a member of the Montreal Canadiens back in 2009. He chased the puck to the red line where Ovechkin beat him in a race. Ovi poked the puck off the boards and around Hamrlik before pulling off a spin-o-rama to skate into the Montreal zone. Kyle Chipchura back checked to catch him, knocking Ovechkin to the ice. But as the Capitals star slid toward Carey Price, he flicked the puck on the forehand past the Montreal goaltender for a spectacular goal. Ovechkin sat up, raised his arms and waved for his teammates to join him in celebration.
Wes Johnson, the Capitals’ longtime public address announcer, was seated right behind the glass where Ovechkin made his initial move.
“I thought, ‘Oh my God, he passed the puck to himself.’ He spun the defenseman and then he duped the goalie as he’s falling down the ice,” he said. “It was the most spectacular goal I had seen in my 25 years of doing this live.”
1. Jan. 16, 2006: ‘The Goal’
What’s the point of a ranking if not to spark conversation and debate? To that end, any number of Ovechkin’s nimble, flailing classics could have made the top spot, subverting expectations. That would be a stunt. That would be disingenuous.
“The Goal” is his “Citizen Kane,” a masterpiece announcing the arrival of a true artist. When we close our eyes and think about any of the nearly 900 goals that have defined Ovechkin’s career, our mind’s eye will focus on that game in Glendale, Arizona, and what Sportsnet ranked as the greatest goal of the 21st century.
It was Ovechkin’s rookie season, one in which he’d hit 30 goals by the middle of January. He collected the puck at center ice and skated in on Phoenix Coyotes defenseman Paul Mara. He tried to deke Mara, but the defenseman wasn’t biting, raising his arms to try and knock Ovechkin off the puck. He was successful in that Ovechkin toppled to the ice. He was unsuccessful in that Ovechkin was still near enough to the puck.
As the Capitals star rolled onto his back, he had one hand on his stick to corral the puck and send a desperate shot to the Coyotes net. Goalie Brian Boucher flung his stick out as a last line of defense, only to look back at the cage as the puck glided across the line.
In the stands watching “The Goal”? An 8-year-old Coyotes fan named Auston Matthews, who would be inspired to score a few hundred of his own in the NHL. Behind the Coyotes’ bench watching “The Goal”? Gretzky, Phoenix’s head coach and the NHL’s leading career goal-scorer — at the time.
Early in the game, Beninati noted that Ovechkin was only 860 goals behind Gretzky’s record total of 894. Laughlin laughed at the notion that a rookie was beginning down the path to catch The Great One.
“Good luck, Mr. Ovechkin,” Beninati said. “Good luck.”
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Ryan S. Clark
Less than an hour after the United States lost to Canada in overtime of the 4 Nations Face-Off championship game, Detroit Red Wings captain Dylan Larkin was asked about the growth of American hockey and what lies ahead.
“You know what I think it does? I think we’ve had a tough time with USA Hockey getting guys to play in the World Championships,” said Larkin, a five-time World Championships participant. “I think guys are at home watching this and I hope they are wanting a piece of this.
“They gotta go to the World Championships and prove themselves and play for their country. We gotta start winning that tournament. I think that’s where Canada, those guys go and they play.”
Larkin’s words have since sparked a discussion about one of the largest challenges facing the nation’s governing body for the sport as it tries to become the world’s strongest men’s hockey power. Getting there means having an investment that goes beyond marquee events such as the 4 Nations Face-Off or the Olympics, and it all starts with how players regard participation in the IIHF Men’s World Championship.
The leadership team at USA Hockey have heard or read about what Larkin said, as have his peers in the NHL. But a gap persists in getting all of those peers to buy in.
ESPN spoke to 10 sources, including players and management, about why it’s been a struggle for USA Hockey to get more top-level NHL players to participate at the World Championships. And while this year’s edition presents a potential path toward a player making a case for the Olympics roster next February, there are those who feel that shouldn’t be the only motivation to play for Team USA.
“We have to rebuild our culture that the tournament is important and it should be more important than it is for our players,” said Minnesota Wild general manager Bill Guerin, who was Team USA’s GM for the 4 Nations Face-Off, and will also manage the 2026 Olympic team. “The excuses that I hear for guys not going over, they’re not good enough. We need guys to go over. We want to try to start winning more often than we do, and we need our best players to consider going over.
“I know there’s real-life situations. I know there’s injuries. I know there’s contracts. But some of the excuses I’ve heard? Quite honestly, they’re not good enough.”
THE AMERICAN HOCKEY LANDSCAPE has changed dramatically since when Guerin and John Vanbiesbrouck, who is the assistant executive director for hockey operations for USA Hockey, were in the NHL.
Neither of them were born when the U.S. won its second World Championship along with its first Olympic gold medal in 1960. They were youths when the “Miracle On Ice” team made up of amateur players beat the Soviet Union before winning America’s second hockey gold at the 1980 Olympics.
Initially, the annual World Championships tournament was limited to amateur players as well, but the IIHF allowed professionals to participate starting in 1977. The IIHF’s decision came in the wake of the Canada Cup, a six-team tournament featuring pro players that was held five times between 1976 and 1991.
Eventually, the Canada Cup was replaced by the World Cup of Hockey in 1996. The NHL then allowed its players to participate in the Olympics starting in 1998.
This created opportunities for players such as Guerin and Vanbiesbrouck to represent the U.S. throughout their professional careers. It also presented a contrast in terms of how rosters were constructed.
For example, Vanbiesbrouck represented the U.S. at the World Championships four times and was on two Canada Cup teams. He made the roster for both tournaments in 1991. The U.S. roster for the World Championships that year had 10 players younger than 23 while the Canada Cup team had only four players younger than 23.
While Guerin never played at the Worlds, he represented the U.S. at three Olympics and twice at the World Cup of Hockey. Guerin was part of the gold-medal winning team at the 1996 World Cup of Hockey, and the silver-medal winning team at the 2002 Olympics. Team USA’s median age when Guerin played was 30.
“Our expectations have changed,” Vanbiesbrouck said. “Whenever somebody wears the jersey, there’s a certain expectation. There’s an element of national pride to wear a jersey, to honor the flag and honor those people who came before you. It’s a great element in our game.”
One item that helped with elevating those expectations was the creation of the United States National Team Development Program in 1996. The NTDP became an incubator for the nation’s premier U18 and U17 male players.
Prior to the NTDP, the U.S. had medaled only twice — with a pair of bronze-place finishes — at the IIHF U20 World Junior Championships. The NTDP has since played an instrumental role in the U.S. establishing itself as a WJC powerhouse. Team USA has captured seven gold medals since 2010 and won its second consecutive gold earlier this year.
1:02
USA wins world junior hockey title on Teddy Stiga’s golden goal
Teddy Stiga nets the winning goal in overtime as the United States tops Finland to win the world junior hockey championship for the second year in a row.
Between the NTDP producing 98 first-round picks and the success at the World Juniors, it created the hypothesis that USA Hockey should be able to easily recruit players to represent the nation. That much was evident after the 4 Nations Face-Off, and it’s part of why the U.S. is considered to be one of the front-runners for gold at the 2026 Olympics.
“A lot of guys went through the NTDP and even coming here for two weeks, it was the closest group I’ve been around,” Columbus Blue Jackets and Team USA defenseman Zach Werenski said after the 4 Nations Face-Off. “It was awesome being here for two weeks and it was so much fun being around these guys. Everyone bought in. I think that’s a testament to what USA Hockey is doing from younger ages on right now.
“We expect to win. We expect to be in gold medal games and to be in these positions against Canada and the best teams.”
Players like Larkin and Werenski have a different experience compared to those who came before them. Fewer international opportunities existed, because the NHL didn’t allow players to participate in the Olympics in 2018 or 2022, while there have been only two World Cups (2004, 2016) since the first one in 1996.
It left the World Championships as the primary consistent option that could come close to replicating those best-on-best tournaments. But even as the demand for international hockey grows, there remains a disconnect when it comes to U.S. players and the World Championships.
The timing of the World Championships could be a factor. This year’s tournament runs from May 9 through May 25, which is simultaneous to the second round and conference finals of the Stanley Cup playoffs.
This limits the player pool to those whose teams didn’t qualify for the playoffs, or who were eliminated in the first round.
“It’s the time of year when everyone’s really looking for a break, and to go for a month, give it your all and sacrifice? It’s a lot for players,” Vanbiesbrouck said. “Most of the guys in the NHL are family guys, which we can all appreciate. Another is with the hip injuries that are happening today, they need a whole summer to recuperate and there’s so many significant injuries now that take such a long time that we understand. But I think that’s a big factor.”
WINNIPEG JETS DUO Connor Hellebuyck and Nikolaj Ehlers represent just how much differently the World Championships are viewed in the United States compared to the rest of the world.
Hellebuyck grew up in Commerce Township, Mich., which is a 45-minute drive from the NTDP’s headquarters. He grew up watching the Detroit Red Wings and went to games. He watched American-born players such as fellow goalie Jimmy Howard, who he idolized.
But he first learned about the tournament as a 21-year-old who had just finished his first AHL season in 2015, when he received a call from USA Hockey asking him to join the team for the World Championships.
“When USA Hockey called, it was cool. It was a cool experience,” Hellebuyck said. “The more I did it, the more I started to realize it is for the experience and it’s for the young guy trying to get better. It’s not for the veteran unless he wants to travel, unless he wants to see the world or he wants to play a little more hockey.”
American-born players like Hellebuyck often grow up associating hockey in May with the Stanley Cup playoffs. Major League Baseball, the NBA Finals and the PGA Championship, among many other sporting events, are also going on at that time. Having that many options plays into the lack of visibility.
Compare that to Ehlers. He grew up in Aalborg, Denmark where there was a pro hockey team, but nothing like the NHL. As a nation, Denmark has around 5,000 registered hockey players. But it hosted the World Championships for the first time in 2018, and had the eighth-highest total attendance in tournament history. Denmark will co-host this year’s tournament in May with Sweden.
In Europe, the World Championships have become a tentpole event within the European sporting landscape in nations such as Czechia, Finland, Germany, Sweden and Switzerland, home of the IIHF’s headquarters. Last year’s tournament in Czechia set a new tournament total attendance record of 797,727 fans. Five of the 10 most attended tournaments have come since 2010, none of which were in North America.
The U.S has hosted the tournament three times — with the most recent coming in 1962, when it was hosted in Colorado Springs and Denver. Canada, which has won the tournament a record 28 times, has hosted the World Championships just once, back in 2008.
Vanbiesbrouck said there haven’t been any discussions throughout his time with USA Hockey about trying to host the event, adding that he would like to challenge the status quo and “be able to say that we could do this.”
Ehlers, who played in his first Worlds in 2016, said the tournament has such a reverence in Europe that fans will travel to support their respective homelands. But for nations such as Denmark, Ehlers said the Worlds provide them a chance to show they do belong.
“To be able to have had the amount of NHL players that we’ve had over years and the way that we’ve gone at The Olympics, they reached the quarterfinals at the last Olympics,” said Ehlers, who is one of 17 Danes to play in the NHL. “We’ve beaten Canada and Sweden and teams like that. We go out there to try to prove we are not a small hockey country even though we are in the big picture.”
Or as Guerin said: “Because it matters to them. It’s important and it needs to be important for us.”
WHAT CAN USA HOCKEY do to get more NHL players to play at the Worlds?
Guerin said that the organization has developed a program allowing players to bring their family members and/or friends to Europe for the tournament. Vanbiesbrouck added that it’s something they’ve evolved after observing what Canada had with its program.
Utah Hockey Club coach Andre Tourigny — Canada’s coach for the past two cycles — said Hockey Canada created a family environment. He said bringing families over for the tournament means there’s a chance for them to share what it means to be in a different part of the world. But when it’s time to play, those individual families then create their own community despite being thousands of miles away from home.
“Admittedly, USA Hockey has had to do a better job of getting the people and bringing them over with a certain standard and they’ve done that,” Guerin said. “The last little while they’ve stepped up to the plate and made it a better experience for the players, their wives and their families. It can just be a great opportunity to play for your country. Hopefully, we start to see more guys feel the importance of that tournament.”
Wild forward Matt Boldy said that Guerin and others within USA Hockey have done a strong job of emphasizing why the World Championships matter, and how they used it in their process for creating Team USA’s 4 Nations Face-Off roster.
Boldy said he viewed going to the World Championships as a chance to show how he could be counted upon playing in a different system in international play. Especially when he saw other nations bring more of their best players to the tournament.
A two-time World Championship team member, Boldy got a chance to learn from Johnny Gaudreau and Brock Nelson, two players he grew up watching. While Boldy learned from them on the ice, he also got a chance to know them as people, which he said helped when it came to establishing a dynamic with teammates.
“I think the more that we can get our USA guys there playing together, comfortable with each other … it just makes things easier so in tournaments like the 4 Nations, it makes that transition smoother,” Boldy said. “It’s a big tournament. Every country wants to win it including the U.S. If we can get our biggest guys there and everyone kind of spends that extra time together, it could mean a lot.”
Guerin and Vanbiesbrouck said that they have heard from the agents of American players who missed out on the 4 Nations Face-Off about wanting to be involved in the Olympics. Vanbiesbrouck said that the 4 Nations event also made older players realize that the 2026 Olympics might be their final opportunity to play for Team USA.
“It’s one of those things where if you want to be in one of those tournaments and participate, then, be a part of it,” Guerin said. “Don’t be a part of it when you want to be a part of it. A lot of the guys we’ve had have gone to the World Championships and done that. If you want to have a better shot of something like the 4 Nations and the Olympics, help us in other areas. We need it. It’s not just trying to win the 4 Nations or The Olympics.
“The World Championships go on every year and we want to try to win it. That’s the bottom line.”
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